Faerie Blood: An Urban Fantasy Novel (The Changeling Chronicles Book 1) (7 page)

“Ivy Lane.” Larsen glared at me from the doorstep. “What’s this?”

He held up the defunct spell I’d brought in from the Swansons’ house. As usual, he wore jeans and a dirty T-shirt, and smelled strongly of cheap beer. I moved past Isabel to stare him down.

“A spell,” I said.

“It’s death magic.” He threw it in my face. “We don’t deal with necromancers here.”

I caught the spell on reflex. “Neither do I. That’s why I was getting rid of it. There were teenagers—”

“Can anyone confirm that?” He moved close so his stinking breath wafted in my face. “You’ve been defying my rules for too long. If you’ve been consorting with death mages, you won’t be welcome in my office any longer.”

Where the hell did that come from?

“I don’t have anything to do with the necromancers. Ugh.”

The surly old bastard narrowed his eyes at me. He was part shifter and always claimed he could sniff out lies, but he couldn’t change forms and hadn’t so much as a drop of magical talent. He hated the mages, so there was absolutely no way I’d tell him about the Mage Lord.

“Get rid of that spell,” said Larsen. “And if you bring anything like that near my office again, you’re fired.”

Whoa. He walked away, leaving Isabel gawping at me.

“I’ll have to stick a notice to the door where people can add their names to the ‘Threaten Ivy’ list while I’m at the mages’ place,” I said, staring after him. “Damn.”

“What, you’re actually going to the Mage Lord?” Isabel tugged her hair loose from her ponytail as I closed the door.

“What do you take me for? This case is mine. The guy’s a dick, and he’s not taking my job from me.”

“What’s going on?” Henry Cavanaugh peered from the top of the stairs to the upper flat. He was a wolf shifter, so he’d probably sensed Larsen coming. He and his wife were friendly enough, if a little too willing to let their four-year-old son get too close to my spells. On cue, little George ran downstairs and threw his arms around me. Apparently
he
didn’t think I smelled like hellhound. “What’s that?”

Oh, crap. I held the dead summoning spell out of reach. “Nothing.”

Isabel, realising my dilemma, took the spell from me. “I’ll ask the coven to get rid of it. What was Larsen’s problem?”

“Hell if I know. Thanks, by the way.” I tilted my head to look at Henry, who came downstairs. “You haven’t seen any faeries around here, have you?”

Call me paranoid, but I needed to check nothing had followed me home.

“No. Didn’t you bash a troll’s head in the other day?” he asked, taking George’s hand and leading him away from me.

“Rumours,” I said. “I just knocked it out.”

“Come in,” said Isabel. “I made cookies. Henry, do you want some?”

I led the way into the flat and helped myself to Isabel’s glorious cookies. They tasted like cinnamon and divine goodness, and made me think today wasn’t a complete wreck after all.

Henry frowned and sniffed at the ceiling. “Has another shifter been here?”

I hesitated. “No.” Not strictly a lie. I didn’t want the whole world to know the Mage Lord had taken an interest in me.

Isabel’s eyes were sharp, but she refrained from speaking. Henry’s wolf senses were rarely wrong. And from the flare of his nostrils and the tension in his shoulders, he smelled trouble.

The Mage Lord practically defined ‘trouble’. But if I refused to go to him, I’d lose my job. Trapped on all sides. I took another cookie as casually as I dared, listening to George’s babbling about his new friends. Shifter kids played much nicer with others than the mages or necromancers—and considerably more so than half-faeries. Considering shifters turned into hairy or scaly monsters on a monthly basis, the Cavanaugh family had their lives together a damn sight better than I did.

“Can you always smell when another shifter’s been nearby?” asked Isabel. “How far out?”

“Only within the town’s limit, usually,” said Henry, taking a delicate bite of the cookie. “The Ley Line interferes otherwise. Goes right through the centre of our territory.”

Isabel nodded. “Yeah, it does.” Witches’ powers were amplified by the energies swirling around the line. Getting close made spells go haywire, but most magic users, aside from mages, couldn’t use their powers away from it.

The line used to be invisible. Until the faeries used it as a conduit to open a gate into our world, permanently bringing magic into the spotlight. I didn’t go near it if I could help myself, but maybe the witches living along the line had sensed something screwy when the changeling showed up. If anywhere contained enough energy to summon up a changeling, the Ley Line did. Then again, the Swansons’ house was nowhere near there.

George tugged at my hand. “You look sad,” he said. “Have another cookie.”

I loved that kid. “Sure,” I said, taking one. “Just thinking about the job I’m working on. Looking for someone,” I added vaguely to Henry. “It’s to do with the faeries.”

On cue, Erwin flew through the room with a squeal.

“I thought I smelled one of them,” said Henry. “It’s not as distinctive as a shifter’s scent. Are you
certain
one didn’t come here? The whole doorway smells like… power.”

Power had a smell? I supposed, to shifters, it did. And now Isabel stared openly at me.

“Not that I know of.” I shrugged. “You and Susie are the only shifters I know. Can you sense which type of shifter it is by scent?”

Henry took a deep breath, inhaling. “A powerful one. A rare kind of power. I should go.”

What? “Huh? There’s nobody here. What kind of power?”

“The type at the top of the shifter chain,” he said. “They’re rare enough not to form their own packs. Tend to be loners. Predators.”

I thought of the Mage Lord.
I can see that.

Not all shifters banded together. When they’d hidden from the world, they’d once lived in packs, isolated from society, but like witch blood, shifter blood had been diluted enough that a significant portion of the population carried the gene without even knowing it.

The image of those black scales and claws flashed through my head. The Mage Lord clearly didn’t care who saw what he was. That made him the stark opposite of every shifter I knew.

“I’m heading out anyway.” I needed to put the changeling’s blood to good use, and I wasn’t about to try any experiments with little kids nearby.

First, I had a mage—or shifter—to get off my back.

CHAPTER SIX

Here we go.
I looked up at the headquarters of the mages, an imposing manor-like building with whitewashed walls gleaming in the weak sunlight. Its balconies, endless windows and extensive gardens belonged to a time before the faeries, but the elaborate wards set up around its perimeter told me the mages took their security seriously.
Seriously enough to keep riffraff like me out.

Last time I’d been here had been ten years ago—the day I’d crawled out of Faerie with the lord’s blood still drying on my hands. After wandering around the streets in numb horror and confusion for a few hours, I’d overheard a bunch of sharply-dressed men talking about the faeries.

In this strange new world, faeries seemed to be a given. Piskies fluttered around in packs, sylphs waved from the few trees at the roadside, and nymphs lurked beneath the rivers’ surfaces, eyes glittering. I couldn’t connect this surreal new world with the one I’d left behind. Before, this road had been lined with cars. A single black car with tinted windows was all that remained. Like everyone had vanished.

I’d run after the men in suits when I heard the word
Sidhe.
I wore nothing but a ragged dress one of the other captives had given me when a bunch of crazed fire imps had burned my clothes off. I still remembered the harshness of the sun burning the back of my neck and arms. I’d been under shade for so long, everything had looked like a mirage. Including the manor the men walked up to. I’d never given it a second glance before, but in that moment, it looked like a sanctuary.

One of them had turned back and saw me. Like the others, he wore a smart suit, his hair crisply parted to the side. “Who are you?” he’d asked.

My throat dry, I croaked out, “Ivy. Please, you have to help me. I don’t know where I am.”

“You’re at the headquarters of the Mage Lords,” said the man. “What are you, a witchling? What’s with the blood? Who’d you kill?”

The words had stuck in my throat.
A faerie lord. I killed a faerie lord, and I escaped.
“Nobody, I just want to go home. Do you—do you have a telephone I can use?”

“We’re not a charity.” As the others disappeared into the hallway, he’d watched, like he expected me to leave. Like he wanted me to.

My heart sank into my feet. “Where am I?” I whispered again.

Mortal time passes in a flicker of infinity,
I’d heard in the faerie world. How long might have passed? Were my family—?

The man had watched me, his expression a mixture of distaste and wariness. “No witches allowed in here.”

“I’m not a witch,” I said. “I don’t know where I am. I—when did the faeries come?”

No. No. No.

“Ten years ago.”

No.

That’s when I’d dropped to my knees and screamed. And kept screaming, sure people would come running and help.

Nobody did. The mages had retreated into the townhouse and closed the door on my screams, leaving me alone, burning on the outside, icy cold on the inside, with faerie blood on my hands.

Ten years. Only three had passed for me. My family was dead. The changeling who’d replaced me was missing. And I’d had nothing left.

Another ten years later and the manor looked exactly the same. Trimmed hedges lined the path, and the usual wrought-iron fence kept out any intruders who weren’t put off by all the glowing wards. I hovered outside, not seeing any way to knock. Did I have to stand here until someone came to find me?

A man appeared from the shadows, quiet as a ghost. He hardly looked older than twenty, his smile disconcertingly inhuman. Nobody I knew had teeth that perfectly even and white. His smooth dark hair flowed to shoulder length, his eyes like ice blue chips. Nobody I knew had eyes that unnatural bright shade, either, unless he wore contacts.

“Your licence?”

“Back off, faerie.” Did the mages employ faerie guards? I’d thought they had nothing to do with the Sidhe. But this guy sure as hell wasn’t pure human.

The dazzling smile disappeared as his
jaw tensed. “I’m no faerie. Give me your licence.”

“I have an invitation from your leader, the
esteemed
Lord Colton,” I said. “And believe me, I don’t want to be here.”

“Then leave,” he said. “Don’t talk about my boss that way.”

“I’ve been ordered to come here,” I said, standing my ground. No magic surrounded him, but he was definitely fey. I moved so he could see the sword at my waist.

Suddenly, a knife was in his hand. “Back off, witch,” he said.

I stepped towards him. “Try me, faerie.”

“I’m not—”

“What is going on here?” Vance Colton appeared behind the gate, which creaked open as though he’d given it a verbal command. He didn’t wear the long coat this time, but a tailored shirt and trousers. “Ralph, step aside.”

The faerie boy shot me one final glare and moved behind me to stand guard at the gate’s side.

“Ivy,” said Lord Colton. “I hoped you’d see sense.”

I gritted my teeth to stop myself digging a deeper hole, and followed him through the gates.

“Your pretty faerie guard pulled a knife on me.” This place was even more upper-class than I remembered, with elaborate hedge cuttings in the shapes of animals and even a tinkling fountain in the middle of the immaculate lawn. Curling magical glyphs decorated the walls. Mages didn’t need runes to cast spells or even set up wards. The decorations were for show, like everything else.

“Faerie?” Lord Colton frowned at me over his shoulder. “If you mean Ralph, don’t say that to his face. You aren’t scaring away my assistants, are you?”

“If they’re running scared from me, there’s something wrong with your system.”

“There’s no reason to be so hostile,” he said, walking to the doorstep. “I’m offering you a favour.”

“By threatening to take away my livelihood.” Like I’d let him play word games with me now. “I took on the case first. You turned it down.”

“Before I knew magic was involved.” He pushed the door open and beckoned me into the hallway.

“Faeries,” I corrected. “I’ll bet you don’t know the difference between a boggart and a brownie.” I hesitated before following. The manor repelled me. But what choice did I have?

“If you’re an expert, tell me the name of the species that attacked us yesterday,” he said. I couldn’t see anything ominous behind him, so I walked into the thickly carpeted hall.